When does a day begin? When does it end? Does dawn arrive with the distant blush of the dark sky? Or does it set in when a young sun hesitatingly appears at the horizon? Does the dwindling warmth announce a day’s demise, or does it linger till the last light is sucked out? Day is imperceptibly born in dawn and dissolves as furtively in dusk. Autumn unhurriedly begets winter. Winter disappears in spring. Spring after a protracted labour births summer that unbeknownst metamorphoses into autumn. When does life begin? Does the beat of foetus’ heart announce a new life? What about the three-day old embryo or a single-celled zygote after fertilization of the egg? Or each of the ova and the millions of sperm? Each of these throbs with potential of bringing forth a new life. Nature goes on cycling in its rhythm, ceaselessly and imperturbably. These relentless revolutions, pursued over eons, give rise to variations. Newer elements born with their unique cycles mingle in the grind of unive...
I spent fourteen months in Afghanistan, two years after the fall of Taliban in 2001. Colours of these memories are sharp and Afghanistan never feels far. It isn’t actually; Kabul is 990 km from Delhi, Mumbai is 1410. Events of the last two weeks ceaselessly churn these impressions. A medley of disparate images flashes across mind every now and then. Rush of memory defies chronology even as I - in an attempt to capture some in words - try hard to discipline the unruly surge. It was a strange world I entered on a cold day of December in the year 2003. Kabul looked fetching from air, a valley surrounded by low mountains and the city timidly creeping on to the slopes of the surrounding hills. On ground, it was far from beautiful. Airport was small, noisy, and cluttered. Tall, swarthy, bearded men with thick blankets wound around their torsos, many with guns slung on shoulders or the barrel menacingly poking from beneath the folds of the shawl, were ev...
How does one know past? Is history faithful in capturing it? Is history a discovery or an invention? History is the study of past societies, cultures, and civilisations. Historians analyse material remains of old civilisations such as archaeological diggings, artifacts, documents, and literature to build their narrative. They write about events removed hundreds and thousands of generations from their time. Cultures and civilisations are the product of human thought. And thoughts change with time Stones do not speak. Mind, with its ideas, is not fossilised. Zeitgeist is not recorded on imperishable tablets. Sketchy written documents, if any are available, never relate a cogent, verifiable narrative. How do historians then collate history of ideas from the material evidence they study? When the evidence is so feeble, what is it that allows an historian to read the mind of historical figures, to discover intentions behind their apparent actions, to comment on their morals? Historians...
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